The Titanic And The Poseidon Adventure – Coincidence?
Anyone even the least bit familiar with the history of The Titanic is also familiar with one of the great coincidences surrounding the tragedy. Fourteen years prior to that fateful day in 1912, Morgan Robertson wrote a novella entitled “Futility”, about the world’s largest, most luxurious, and safest ocean liner. This new ship was said to be unsinkable due to the newest water tight compartments they had installed. Coincidentally, that ship sank after hitting an iceberg. An even more remarkable coincidence is that the name of the ship in the fictitious story was “The Titan”!
But here’s a little known fact you can use to amaze your friends and family. On that fateful last night aboard the Titanic, over 200 Second Class passengers were eagerly holed up in the Second Class dining room. What was keeping these passengers so entertained? Why, a new fangled contraption called a Motion Picture! And what were they watching? What else? “The Poseidon Adventure”!
The film industry was still in it’s infancy in 1912 and had only recently graduated to projecting movies onto screens for entire audiences to enjoy. Movies of the day were short, no more than a reel, and of course, filmed in black and white with no sound. Nevertheless, this new entertainment industry had captured the imagination of the people and the Titanic carried it’s own movie projector and library of movies.
Due to the undesirable image the film industry had created for itself in the early days of the Nickleodeon, the snooty, First Class passengers were offended by the movies being shown onboard the Titanic. However, the Second Class passengers were hungry for the new entertainment. So there movies were shown at 11 PM, after the First Class Passengers retired for the evening, and only in the Second Class dining room.
The audience of a few hundred Second Class passengers was so enthralled with The Poseidon Adventure – a tale of six passengers and crew members struggling to survive the sinking of their ship ” that they either didn’t feel the shudder of the ship as it struck the iceberg or they took no notice. In fact, they were so entertained by the movie that it was shown a second time, immediately after the first.
The Poseidon Adventure was an unusually long movie for it’s time, and with 2 back to back showings of 53 mnutes each, it was well after 1AM when these Second and Third Class passengers finally returned to the deck. By that time, the few lifeboats that there were had already been launched, most at only partial capacity and occupied by First Class Passengers.
This grim coincidence could explain why barely one third of the Titanic’s Second Class Passengers survived while nearly two thirds of the First Class passengers and crew made it to safety.
